


The End of Curation

by tonbosan



Category: The Walking Dead (Telltale Video Game)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-06
Updated: 2019-02-06
Packaged: 2019-10-23 10:26:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17681687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tonbosan/pseuds/tonbosan
Summary: Events in Luke's life remind him of some of his favorite paintings.





	The End of Curation

1\. The Family of Street Acrobats: The Injured Child by Gustave Doré, 1873

Luke scoops up the girl, face smeared with walker blood, and runs, Pete following behind. He cradles her in his arms as he rushes through the forest dodging walkers, while she pants and flutters in and out of consciousness. 

When they're safe, they slow to a walk and the girl looks up at him, pale and afraid. 

He can't believe she's survived this long on her own - she looks no more than 11.

And when he sees the bite mark on her forearm, he panics and dumps her on the ground like she's no longer human, and hates himself for it. 

 

2\. Sleep by Salvador Dalí, 1937

Luke catches sight of his legs first, then the rest of him, lying motionless on the floor of the shed, and for a half-second thinks he's dead, and feels beyond terrible. 

Then Nick lifts his head. "Hey man...you got any aspirin?" he says. 

Passed out on moonshine. He should've guessed. Typical Nick.

Luke walks up behind him, gets his hands underneath his armpits, and pulls him to a standing position. 

Nick's eyes are red and his lip trembles. Luke's seen that look on him not that long ago, after he had to put his mom down. He wraps his arms around him and breathes in whiskey soaked sweat. 

"Pete's dead," Nick says, utterly devastated, and sobs into his shoulder.

"I know, man. I do." He hates to see Nick hurting so bad, wishes he could spare the time to comfort him, but they have to get moving now that Carver knows where their cabin is. He tells him this. 

"Can you make it?"

Nick says he can. He looks at him with those sad blue eyes of his and it breaks Luke's heart that they don't have time to mourn Pete's Uncle - his surrogate father - and he wants to make it up to Nick somehow but he doesn't know how. So he just lets go of Nick and walks away, wondering who the hell this world's making him become. 

 

3\. The Scream by Edvard Munch, 1893

Luke will never forget that face - the moment it froze in shock. The young man they were talking to stares at them in wild-eyed horror and clutches his neck. Blood leaks out of it and drips onto the slats of the suspension bridge they're standing on. He trembles, staggers to the side, and then pitches over the edge, just like that. The drop's so far they can't hear him land. 

That was a person they'd just killed, a seemingly nice person, about their age, who had offered to help them - not a reanimated flesh eating monster. 

He could have been one of them. 

Luke sees that face in his nightmares and suspects Nick and Clementine see it too.

He sees the guilt eating away at Nick, sees that nothing he says is going to keep it at bay. Luke wonders what he would have done if he had been in Nick's place, if he would have shot first, or if the man would have shot him instead. 

 

4\. Convergence by Jackson Pollock, 1952

Carver rains punches all over Luke's face. He lands kicks in his gut, ribs, back. He spits on him, slams his head against the floor. He just keeps going, and after a little while Luke can't separate the pain from anything else. It's like he's never known what it's like not to feel pain.

Spots dance in his vision. Luke's never tasted so much blood. He cries out each time he's hit but after a certain point he he can no longer hear himself, or Carver, or anyone else.

He does hear a rib crack, though, and his senses are flooded with white hot, shattering pain. He screams and all he can see are blurs of red, white, yellow, and black.

Then the blows stop and he's lying on his back, panting, bleeding, and the room won't stop spinning. 

Someone touches his face, wipes blood off it. He flinches. A man is saying something, but he sounds like he's underwater. Luke tries to say something back, but he can't, and starts coughing, spits out more blood. 

He clutches at his ribs, the broken one pierces his insides. The pain is mindblowing.

"Luke," someone says, "Luke, can you hear me?" And he can, finally. And now he sees Carlos hovering above him, feels him touching him with a damp cloth, trying to clean him up. 

"I..." he pants. "My...rib's busted." He winces and coughs some more, and his vision blackens. He wonders if he has a concussion. Luke tries to sit up but can't even lift his back off the ground.

"Luke, just stay still. Don't try to get up yet," Carlos says.

"Feel like I'm about to pass out, I-" His eyelids flutter and a wave of dizziness hits him.

"Luke-" 

"-can't stay awake, I...think I...," he trails off and his eyes fall shut. 

Little multicolored spots dance behind his eyelids like fireworks. It would be almost pretty if every inch of him didn't hurt so damn much. 

 

5\. Black Iris by Georgia O'Keeffe, 1926

Luke knows it's a bad idea but it sounds like a good one at the time, and when are they going to get this chance again - probably not anytime soon, maybe even ever. 

And he needs this, he really does. 

'Cause no one's wanted him like that since the dead came to life and they started running. 

And 'cause Pete's dead, Alvin's dead, Carlos's dead, Sarita's dead, and Sarah's dead. 

And Nick - *Nick* is fucking dead. Luke can't even remember a time when Nick wasn't right there with him. And he wants to talk to him, wants to apologize to him for letting him go for help on his own, especially after he'd been shot in the fucking shoulder - what was he thinking? - wants to at least say goodbye to him, 'cause he didn't even get the chance. But he can't.

Luke doesn't want to have to think anymore. So he nods at Jane. *Yeah, I'd like that.*

And then he leans back against the wall and stares at her, glaze-eyed, as she bends over him and unbuckles his belt. She unzips his fly and sticks her hand down his boxers, and god it feels fan-fucking-tastic and it's been so long since he's had someone else's hand on his cock, and Luke must have a funny expression 'cause Jane laughs, and he says "What?", and she says, "Luke, if you could see your face right now."

But he can only see Jane, and he wants to make her face contort. He reaches up and unzips her jacket and slides his hands up her body, underneath her shirt, and cups her breasts. And she shivers and arches her back, and he likes that she likes it, and he rubs his thumbs against her nipples, and she sucks in a breath, and he feels them harden, which makes him harder. She starts grinding against his erection, grinning when he bites back a moan, and he can't wait to watch her smug expression come apart. 

Then he's inside her, and this - *this* truly transports him. His hands are around her hips and hers are gripping his shoulders, and his back's bumping against the wall, and it's been so long that he has to call on every ounce of his willpower not to come till she's ready.

And Luke pushes all the thoughts that this is a terrible idea and they should be watching the perimeter like they're supposed to away, and it doesn't even cross his mind that they're not using protection and he should really consider pulling out. All he lets himself think about is how good she feels around him, how good it feels not to think about anything else, and how he wants this to happen again, and again, and again. 

And in a way, in a certain light, it's the best sex of his life. 

When it's over and she's sprawled next to him, Luke feels almost like a different person, like the guy he was before he saw his friends and family eating each other alive, when he was just an underemployed curator, art critic, and former gallery co-owner who'd grown up on a Tennessee farm and went hiking with his buddies on the weekend carrying a six pack of Bud and a bucket of ice. 

He looks at her and smiles, and she smiles back, and they've both got that post-coital glow going, and neither of them has any regrets whatsoever yet, and he tells her how human he feels. And he's about to lean over and kiss her, when-

"What are you doing?"

-Clementine pokes her head around the corner and he's back to reality and reality really, really sucks and he has no fucking idea what to say.

 

6\. The Break-Up of the Ice, Claude Monet, 1880

There's something exceptionally beautiful about this lake, Luke thinks as he steps out onto it. The air is crisp and cold enough to make his breath visible, and he inches forward, not wanting to damage the sheet of ice below that's so clear he can see his reflection.

The others are ahead of him, moving faster because none of them has been shot in the leg (or had a rib cracked). But it's okay, he's going to be okay. The bullet went clean through and it doesn't hurt *that* much, especially with the painkillers Clementine gave him. 

But there are walkers on the ice now, and he has to pick up the pace a little, so he does, but he's still trying to be careful, and he notices the ice starting to crack a little around his shoes, and he really didn't want to mess up this picture perfect, pristine frozen lake but now he has.

Luke keeps moving forward, always has to keep moving if he wants to live, and the cracks forming around his feet are growing bigger, and he can hear the sound of the ice breaking, but he has to stay calm, and just keep putting one foot-

There's a crash and he falls to the ground, kneeling, with his back leg, the injured one, halfway into the water.

And fuck that water's cold.

Bonnie and Clementine are shouting at him and trying to get closer, and he's telling them not to, 'cause that'll just put more weight on the ice, making things worse for everyone. 

And his leg's going numb, and sinking deeper into the water, but Luke thinks if he just gets a good grip on the clumps of ice in front of him, he can pull himself out.

Clementine's getting closer - she's not listening to him - and so are the walkers. Luke tells her to shoot them, but she ignores him and keeps creeping towards him, and he tells her to stop, but she doesn't, and now she's almost close enough to reach him, she's stretching out her arms, but the added weight's too much; he falls completely in.

Luke plunges into the lake and water fills his lungs. He swims upward, the light shining through the hole he's made in the ice above him guiding his way back. 

Something else hits the water, and then he sees Clementine swimming towards him. Luke has to reach her, has to get her to the surface before she freezes to death in here with him. 

But then a walker swims in front of him, gliding toward her. It reaches its skeletal arms out to grab Clementine, but he won't let anything hurt her. 

Clementine is not going to die for him.

Luke grabs the walker from behind and snaps its neck like a twig. The adrenaline's taken over, it seems, and he has that incredible strength you read about where mothers are able to lift up cars with one arm to save their babies trapped beneath them. He's way beyond feeling the cold now, he just swims upward, toward Clementine, and she reaches for him.

He's about to take her hand when something grabs him from below. The walker's pulling on his injured leg, dragging Luke down, down far below the surface. 

He sees Clementine's anguished face, she's getting smaller and smaller, and then he can't see her anymore.

It's just ice water now, and Luke's sinking, his lungs are giving out, and he knows this is how he's going to die. But still, he has to try not to, to outlast the reaper and keep swimming upward as long as he can. He swings his arms forward and kicks with all his remaining strength.

But it's just too cold, and there's no air, just icy, icy water filling Luke's lungs, running through his mouth, nose, and ears. 

He's going to lose consciousness in a moment. Before the end comes, he wonders if Clementine made it out, or if she died trying to save him. He thinks she got out, 'cause otherwise he'd probably see her down here in this watery grave with him, wouldn't he? And that thought makes him happy - at least he can leave this fucked up world happy. 

And he does.


End file.
